George Ignatieff (1913–1989), one of Canada’s most celebrated diplomats and a man devoted to the cause of peace, was among the comparatively small number of Russian newcomers who landed on Canadian shores in the 1920s.

Ignatieff, whose father was a famous Russian aristocrat, was born in St. Petersburg on 16 December 1913. Within a few brief years, the Russian Revolution and civil war had put an end to his sheltered childhood and the wealth and privileges enjoyed by his family. His public–spirited and highly respected father, once an education minister under the Czar, was arrested and jailed in 1918 by the Bolsheviks, but then was miraculously released in time for the family to escape to England.

In England, the neophyte émigrés operated a dairy farm. Young George attended St. Paul’s, a boarding school, until the sale of the farm forced the family to move once again. While his father tried to raise funds in Europe for Russian refugees, Mrs. Ignatieff set out in 1928 with George and his brother, Leonid, for Canada, where two other brothers of George’s, Nick and Jim, had already settled.

Although there was barely enough money for basic necessities, George’s resourceful mother managed to squeeze enough out of the household budget to send her young son to Montreal’s exclusive Lower Canada College. The stock market crash of 1929, however, put an abrupt end to George’s private–school education. With the advent of the Great Depression, Ignatieff and the rest of his family united under one roof in Thornhill on the northern outskirts of Toronto.

56 Comments:

I'll tell you something, I'm a former Liberal that neither likes nor trusts Ignatieff. I watched the ad and read the war room stuff. This is the stuff about Ignatieff that just makes me squirm. He's so full of shit there's absolutely no way I want him to be PM. I will be soooo happy when the election is over and this guy is tossed. Maybe then I'll come back to the party.

I'll tell you something, I'm a former Conservative that neither likes or trusts Harper. This is the stuff about Harper that just makes me squirm. He's so full of shit there's absolutely no way I want him to be PM. I will be soooo happy when the election is over and this guy is tossed. Maybe then I'll come back to the party.

Ignatieff's family history is not an asset it is a liability. Canadians absolutely do not relate to this story nor to Ignatieff in general. So what idiot designed that ad? Sure, it looks all warm and fuzzy if you're a Liberal. But it opens a line of attack that poll after poll has shown Ignatieff is weak on. It shows extremely poor strategy. Ignatieff has repeated come off as an arrogant elitist. Raising his family background REINFORCES that narrative. Ignatieff has about as much political instinct as a doorknob.

Who do the Liberals need to defend Iggy’s past? Can’t they just stand on their principals and policy? Oh, I forgot... they don’t have any. As Liberal Robert Fowler reminded them... “I have the impression that they will endorse anything and everything which might return them to power.”

"Immigrants to Canada are more skilled than immigrants to the United States. George J. Borjas compared immigrants to Canada and the United States finding those to Canada being better educated and receiving higher wages once settled. He accredits this to Canada's points based immigration system, and argues for the United States to more closely emulate the Canadian method.[21]

Within the Canadian economy, immigrants are most found at the highest education levels. In Canada, 38% of male workers with a post-graduate degree are immigrants to the country.[22] 23% of Canadians are foreign born, but 49% of doctorate holders and 40% of those with a masters degree were born outside Canada."

I'll tell you something, I'm a former Green-supporter that neither likes or trusts May. This is the stuff about May that just makes me squirm. She's so full of nonsense there's absolutely no way I want her to be PM. I will be soooo happy when the election is over and this leader is tossed. Maybe then I'll come back to the party.

Not typical? Not of economic refugees, sure, but it is of political refugees, and of an increasing number of regular immigrants, nowadays, given that Jason Kenney is ramping up the Entrepreneur & Investor class immigrant quotas and cutting back on refugee & family ones.

"To Qualify, a successful Entrepreneur Class applicant is one who has:- managed a qualifying business and has controlled a percentage of equity of the qualifying business for at least two years in the period beginning five years preceding the application; and

- Possesses a personal net worth of C$300,000 legally obtained....

"The Investor class confers permanent residence to applicants who demonstrate an ability to become economically established in Canada on the basis of their business or management experience and a personal net worth of at least C$800,000. Approval is contingent upon the investor undertaking to commit an irrevocable, passive, non-interest bearing five-year investment of C$400,000 in a government guaranteed investment fund."

"The link from the war room indicated his family had in excess of $ 120k before arriving in Canada."

No. The claims made by the war room are that his family had money before coming to England. They used that money to buy a farm. They lost money on the farm and it was sold. The government website for Citizenship and Immigration Canada says when he came to Canada the family barely had enough to pay for essentials, and that his mother had to work hard to pay for his education (which ended a year later when the depression hit).

In other words - there is no reason to believe the family had much money at all when they came to Canada.

Not so atypical, after all, then, and so despite the mis-impression the CPC attack site was trying to create & tweeter-dums are dutifully parroting, MI's new ad IS true: their family did come to Canada with virtually nothing... certainly not with the assets, vocation and prestige they'd enjoyed in their home country.

And it turns out that former Ministers of Education don't make the best farmers. Who knew?!

I was a conservative voter in 2008 because the government promised to focus on important issues, and more or less had for their previous years in office.

Where did all that go?

Whether Ignatieff is a child of the frickin' czar or the son of a Belgian prostitute is beyond me - even if Ignatieff raised the issue. I hold this stuff against the Tories in exactly the same way I'd hold it against the Liberals if they hit Harper for having so many home provinces, even if HE was the first to raise the issue.

For a Tory government that says it wants to focus on the economy so much, I sure have a hard time finding proof that they have even heard the word are amidst all this fraternity house crap that the party HQ is pouring out.

I'm voting libertarian if there's an election this spring, in disgust. And I don't even like libertarians, so that will compound my disgust even further.

As a long time liberal voter, bagman, pepper spray salesman, and CBC employee, I'd like ro redouble my support of Liberal leader Dion and his .. ? What? It's not Dion? Wow, that was fast.. Who is it now? Who? He's not even Canadian.. Whatever..

Senseless is a disgrace to our country's name s/he tries to appropriate for [it]self.

It wasn't "some real estate deal" -- which is misleading; it was a dairy farm, which they bought & worked themselves... ineffectively, into the ground, for 10 years.

And even if they had _some_ money when MI's grandmother & sons got here (the grandfather came later), it was only enough to rent, not to buy, accommodations here, and the grandmother had to work for the younger sons' (Iggy's father's) tuition, etc.

And as I noted above, immigrants (as opposed to refugees or temporary workers) today have to have at least $800,000 in assets, for the investor class; $300,000 for entrepreneur class; and even skilled trades & professional class "must also show that you have enough money to support yourself and your dependants after you arrive in Canada."

"the war room provides a link to $ 120k that they lost in a real estate deal after leaving Russia?"

Again, NO they did not do this. Is reading plain English somehow difficult for you? If buying a business, working at it for 10 years and having that business fail is a "real estate deal" then you might have a point, but it isn't, so, yet again, you don't.

"This is not a typical immigrants story anyway you cut it."

Actually, they were typical immigrants many ways you cut it.

"It is okay to resort to personal attacks after all failing to address the 120k figure Gayle."

Except that a) I DID address it (you are the one who failed to do that), and b) pointing out you are making stuff up is a statement of truth, not a personal attack.

I do that because you keep on making stuff up. It is so easy to address your dubious points because they are founded on pure fiction. I am sorry if this embarasses you, but if you at least tried basing your arguments on reality and facts and stuff, you probably would not look so pathetic.

Christ, you people are all "political junkies", the world has problems all over, and the biggest thread in weeks on CalgaryGrit: was the Ignatieff immigrant experience authentic? Choose your party's color headbands and line up to brawl.

While the Ignatieffs have made the most of their coming to Canada in their respective fields, they have never ceased to enjoy great privilege, as a function of the financial and educational resources and social status they brought with them, and which are theirs to this day. The Ignatieff immigrant experience is one of significant wealth, first-rate educations and privilege. Very few Canadian families can claim this “immigrant experience.”

Ignatieff story about being a working man living paycheck to paycheck or having a tough time is not working.

It is a mistake in re-branding him as a commoner. He comes from the political class. I don't begrudge him the status, wealth, wealth and resources that have been inherited or earned.

Maybe go watch the video and point out the part where Ignatieff says he lived "paycheque to paycheque" or that he had a "tough time".

What he said was that his father came here with nothing (true), that he had to climb up "that ladder" one rung at a time (true), that he learned the value of hard work (true), and that he instilled a great love of country in his son (true).

Yet again you resort to making stuff up. The fact you are relying on a quote from a conservative website that is based on the same lies you are touting does not make your argument look less ridiculous and desperate.

Please, keep trying. Poking holes in your "arguments" is easy, but I am bored this Sunday and am easily amused.

This comment from 'katie smith' over at Macleans reconstructs the true story the CPC piece draws from but then misleads about & tip-toes around, well:

"Count Paul Iggy (grandfather), White Russian, not so popular in post-Revolution 1919, flees Russia after facing execution ... Takes family to England ... Gets 25,000 pounds sterling out of Russia ... buys farm in Sussex ... (ie: spends money on farm) ... Count Paul gets depressed, has affair with the lady next door, abandons family in England, runs off to Paris to be depressed with other ex pats ... farm fails ....

Uncle Dima, Iggy's father's older brother, comes back from Canada, sells farm, telegram to Count Paul in Paris - "I'm taking Mom and the two youngest boys (including George, Iggy's father) to Canada" ... Count Paul joins them four years later ... So it seems quite probable that when George and his mother came to Canada with his brothers, they had next to nothing ...

Looks like what the CPC attack site did, was take the part about Count Paul getting 25,000 pounds out of Russia and skipped the part about Count Paul wasting it all and running off ... and did so to say - see, George wasn't poor ... Iggy lied ... The rest of it? Just sneering at Iggy's uncles because they did well, as far as I can tell, and claiming their privilege background gave them an edge (ya, right, like being Russian nobility made any play in those days or any other) ...

Gayle, Senseless is right, that MI says both in town halls & Lib videos that there was a period in which he was a self-employed freelance journalist and author, while he was in Europe, in which lived from paycheque to paycheque, or project to project, like so many contractors these days.

What she's WRONG about is in implying that that's somehow false. Seen his confidential personal tax records or something, have you Penny? Or just making crap up, as usual?

He is also wrong to use it in a discussion about whether his family were "typical" immigrants. Although I am not surprised that once proven wrong CS shifts to a topic where he feels he has traction. Next thing you know he will be discussing voting patterns of Catholic voters.

so, Senseless, about your sniffy "Canada was not their first choice for safety,freedom or a better life."

- first, there were good reasons they might want to stay in Europe rather than crossing the ocean to our more undeveloped small country of 8 million, then (in 1918), incl. the fact that the patriarch wanted to help other White Russians emigrate / escape from the Bolshevik revolution.

-- but, second, what makes you think that was even an option, in, um, the midst of WWI (was Canada even accepting immigrants then?), and when only 3% of ALL Canada's immigrants accepted in that era (b/w 1900-1914) were from Russia? As this historical site notes, an official Cndn immigration pamphlet from that year

"expresses a distinct ambivalence towards the arrival of so many new Canadians, concerned that a great wedge of 'foreigners' was being driven into Canadian life."

Thanks for correcting Gayle about MI claims about living pay check to pay check.

I won't do her research. MI rebranding is a mistake. He is not a commoner. He represents the political class and Liberals should stop aplogizing for his background. (Including his family, they should embrace the aristocracy and social standing)

WW,

I can read the frustration in your post. How is it possible my team keeps getting its head handed to them.

It's simple. Canadians can smell the fake outrage and the small politics.

It won't matter how many times your team flings mud trying to destroy a Conservative without waiting for ALL the facts.

The pollsters are confirming what the by elections results have already. Numbers don't lie. Look to the lack of donors and the balance sheet. The problem is not Dion or Ignatieff. This problem has not been addressed since the changes in 2004.

The shellacking of the Democrats in November 2010 will pale in comparison to the results if we go next week or in 2012.

So to sum up, Senseless, despite all your attempted BS, otherwise, Ignatieff's grandparents DID arrive in Canada with very little to their name; his father DID have to work hard jobs like laying railroad track to put himself through university, until being awarded a Rhodes Scholarship to study at Oxford (which only comes to those who those who get good grades AND are active in the community), and DID teach him the value of hard work, and for a period after HE graduated, Michael worked from paycheque to paycheque, without a guaranteed salary... which is all just as he says in the videos you conbots are trying to discredit.

As for the channel changing poll, well, don't take too much comfort:

not only is it just another highly dubious Darrell Bricker A-R online poll you're clutching at, but it also shows there are more people who don't trust ANY of the parties than there are who trust the CPC (29 vs. 28%, respectively).

And a similar poll by Angus Reid yesterday found that the most support Harper could muster was mere "Acceptance" among 28% of the respondents, while he makes 35% feel "Displeasure," and makes 25% "Disgust[ed], 24% have "Contempt" for him, and he gives 22% feelings of Anger or Shame about him.

And don't look now, but the party just dropped two points (to an 11 point gap) in the new Nanos, and there was a 16 point drop in Harper's leadership index: "the most dramatic one month drop in the past two years ...his advantage on competence and vision have softened ...[and] The fieldwork for this particular national survey was completed prior to the Bruce Carson accusations."

There is no level that Harper and his minions won't stoop. As they showed with their contemptable 'asides' during the prorogation debates of 2008, not even the foundation of our democracy is safe if they can evoke some hatred and fear to save their scaly hides.Time for good Christians, Muslims, Jews and those of any and all faiths to realize that the snake is in the garden.

You keep citing news to suggest this story will drop support for the CPC. (Carson)

Hundreds of polls have been taken with stories claiming scandal and being offside. The Liberals are mired below 30%. It is a fact ask other Liberals if they think adscam and their time-out has been cleared up.

That is the disconnect. The correction on the public record was NEVER about his family. It was Ignatieff trying to re-brand himself as a commoner. It did not work and will draw more criticism when reported.

Unlike all ankle biting anonymous cowards, I am posting my real name because I believe free speech only has worth if individuals are willing to stand behind their opinions.

I am the grandchild of a barely literate Ukrainian peasant who emigrated to Canada with nothing. I am also the spouse of a Russian immigrant, also descended from Russian aristocracy, who emigrated with nothing.

I find the attack on Mr. Ignatieff's late father, who did, in fact, lose family members to Bolshevik execution, appalling, disgusting, and beneath contempt. It matters not that Mr. Ignatieff proudly referred to his father. I can tell you, from my own family's experiences, that having a funny sounding Slavic name in those days would not have made Canadian life for either Mr. Ignatieff nor his father. My Grandfather, a Canadian born of Ukrainian descent, about George Ignatieff's age, told me the prejudices he faced. My Ukrainian mother, decades later, faced the same. Even I remember all those "Bohunk" jokes, often told directly to me in the 1970's and early 1980's, because my ethnicity was hidden by my father's WASP background and surname. I even saw it with derision aimed at our own Premier Stelmach.

None of you know George Ignatieff's story and to assume he lived an easy life, knowing many of his relatives had been shot, that his mother tongue and the graves of his ancestors would be distant memories, and to know that what you may say or do in exile could hurt your family in the USSR is, frankly, disgusting, unconscionable and indefensible. I can't believe any of you jokers are defending this. To know the Conservatives are capable of stooping to this level disgusts me even more.

Finally, unless you have the fortitude to post your real name, I am not interested in any ankle biting.

Political ads are political ads - there is always some reason to distrust them. There is in fact, reason to distrust ads in general. HOWEVER, at least in the Liberal leader we have someone who is trying to give us information about his story, his family and why he values Canada. This is why many people came to Canada, and why people STILL want to come to Canada. Canada is what it is because of Immigrants. And the harper government's hostile attitude towards immigrants is atrocious. The amount of money spent attacking immigrants and refugees is laughable, but also sad. On any given year, the amount spent on these topics (aside from the money used by the harpers to advertise and attack them) is NOTHING compared to the amount they are spending on corporate tax cuts. I guess not everyone can have blood infused with oil the way that harper does - most of us Canadians need to work in the real world and have regular blood. We work, we care about health and we want to invest in our future, not destroy it. But I guess when your pockets are lined with the money of tar sand 'developers' and single function dubious fighter jet manufacturers, you believe that you are the only one that matters. Wake up Canada. Harper is here for harper.

Political ads are political ads - there is always some reason to distrust them. There is in fact, reason to distrust ads in general.

HOWEVER, at least in the Liberal leader we have someone who is trying to give us information about his story, his family and why he values Canada. This is why many people came to Canada, and why people STILL want to come to Canada. Canada is what it is because of Immigrants. And the harper government's hostile attitude towards immigrants is atrocious.

The amount of money spent attacking immigrants and refugees is laughable, but also sad. On any given year, the amount spent on these topics (aside from the money used by the harpers to advertise and attack them) is NOTHING compared to the amount they are spending on corporate tax cuts. I guess not everyone can have blood infused with oil the way that harper does - most of us Canadians need to work in the real world and have regular blood. We work, we care about health and we want to invest in our future, not destroy it. But I guess when your pockets are lined with the money of tar sand 'developers' and single function dubious fighter jet manufacturers, you believe that you are the only one that matters. Wake up Canada. Harper is here for harper.